Reading and Literature Studies · Reading Like a Grade 10 Critic: Literature, Information and Shakespeare

Reading with Purpose: Choosing Texts and Strategies Before, During and After Reading

1.1 1.2About 65 minutes

Learning goals

I can name the three families of texts: literary, informational and graphic.
I can identify a specific purpose for reading a text.
I can choose reading strategies for before, during and after reading.
I can explain what makes a text more complex and plan how to read it.

Words to know

literary text
A text that tells a story or expresses ideas artistically, such as a poem, short story, novel or play.

informational text
A text that explains, reports or argues, such as an article, report or biography.

graphic text
A text that uses words and images together, such as an infographic, map or graphic novel.

purpose
Your reason for reading a text.

anticipation guide
A list of statements about a text's ideas that readers agree or disagree with before and after reading.

annotate
To mark a text with notes and symbols while reading.

skim
To read quickly to get the general idea.

scan
To search a text quickly for one specific piece of information.

Hook: you already read in many different ways

Think about the last hour. Maybe you glanced at a bus schedule to find one time. Maybe you read a friend's text and worked out from three words whether they were joking. Maybe you read a chapter for class and had to remember it for a test.

That is three different kinds of reading. Strong readers change how they read to match why they are reading. In Grade 10 English you will read poems from the 1600s and today, short stories, articles, infographics and a whole Shakespeare play. This lesson gives you a plan for any of them.

Remember from Grade 9

In Grade 9 you practised predicting, questioning, monitoring and fixing up your understanding, and connecting, summarizing and synthesizing across texts. This year you will use those same strategies on increasingly complex texts, and you will choose them on purpose, for a stated reason.

A variety of texts

The Grade 10 Academic course (ENG2D) asks you to read texts from diverse cultures and historical periods. Texts fall into three big families:

Literary texts tell stories or express ideas through art: short stories, novels, poems, plays, memoirs.
Informational texts explain, report or argue: news articles, reports, editorials, textbooks, websites, biographies.
Graphic texts combine words and images to carry meaning: infographics, charts, maps, graphic novels, comics.

Many texts mix families. A graphic novel is literary and graphic. A biography is informational, but it often uses storytelling techniques.

Reading for a specific purpose

Before you read, name your purpose. Common purposes:

To understand information (What happened? How does it work?)
To enjoy (a story you chose yourself counts!)
To analyse (How does the writer create this effect?)
To compare (How are these two texts alike and different?)
To prepare for a task (a role-play, a presentation, an essay)
To research (finding and checking facts from several sources)

Your purpose tells you which strategies to use, how fast to read and what to write down.

Purpose sets your speed. Scanning hunts for one detail, skimming gets the gist, and close reading slows right down to analyse words and ideas.

What makes a text "increasingly complex"?

A text gets harder when it has:

Unfamiliar vocabulary or older language (thou, 'tis, wherefore).
Long sentences with many clauses, or unusual word order.
Context you don't know yet (a different century, country or culture).
A tricky structure: flashbacks, several narrators, no headings.
Layers of meaning: symbols, irony, ideas the writer hints at but never states.

Complex does not mean bad or boring. It means you need a plan.

Strategies before, during and after reading

A reading plan has three stages. Before you read, get your mind ready; during reading, track your thinking; after reading, pull it all together and check what you learned.

Two strategies to try this year

1. The anticipation guide (before reading). You decide whether you agree or disagree with a few bold statements about the text's big ideas before you read. Then you revisit them after. It wakes up your prior knowledge and gives you a reason to read.

2. An annotation code (during reading). Mark the text (or sticky notes) with symbols:

\* important idea
? I have a question
! surprising
C a connection to me, another text or the world
V a vocabulary word to look up

If you are reading a library book, use sticky notes or a notebook with page numbers instead of writing in the book.

Worked example

Let's choose a purpose and a strategy

Plan how to read each text. Name the purpose, the reading speed and two strategies.

A sonnet from the 1590s and a modern poem on the same theme, which you must compare.
A one-page biography of a historical figure you admire, to prepare a short role-play as that person.
An online library database search about a religious or cultural celebration different from your own.

Text 1. Purpose: to compare (word choice and images across two historical periods). Speed: slow, close reading. Strategies: read each poem aloud twice; make a two-column chart of key words and images from each poem.
Text 2. Purpose: to prepare for a task (the role-play). Speed: medium, then a slow reread of key parts. Strategies: jot notes on the person's values and key life events; flag quotations that show how they spoke or thought.
Text 3. Purpose: to research. Speed: skim the search results, then read the best two or three sources closely. Strategies: check who wrote each source and when; take notes in your own words with the source name beside each note.
Check: each plan matches the task. You would not close-read every search result, and you would not skim a sonnet you have to analyse.

1: compare, close reading, aloud and chart. 2: prepare a role-play, jot notes and flag quotations. 3: research, skim then read the best sources closely, check authors and dates.

Practice text: The Globe Theatre

(An informational paragraph written for this website.)

William Shakespeare's acting company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, built the Globe Theatre in 1599 on the south bank of the River Thames in London. It was an open-air theatre: the audience in the cheapest spaces stood in the yard around the stage, while wealthier people sat in covered galleries. Plays ran in the afternoon, using daylight. In 1613 a cannon fired as a special effect during a play set the thatched roof on fire, and the theatre burned down. It was rebuilt the next year. Today a modern reconstruction, Shakespeare's Globe, stands near the original site and has staged plays since 1997.

Worked example

Let's read it with a before, during and after plan

Use one strategy from each stage on the Globe paragraph.

Before: I preview the title and ask what I already know: Shakespeare wrote plays in England a long time ago. Prediction: this will describe where his plays were performed.
During: I annotate. \* beside open-air theatre (the key feature). ? beside galleries: I don't know this word. Reading on, wealthier people sat in covered galleries tells me galleries are raised seating areas with a roof. ! beside the cannon and the fire.
During (monitor): It was rebuilt the next year means 1614. I check that my reading still makes sense.
After: I summarize in one sentence: The Globe was an open-air London theatre built by Shakespeare's company in 1599, burned in 1613, rebuilt in 1614, and reconstructed in modern times. My prediction was correct.

Before: preview and predict. During: annotate (\*, ?, !) and monitor. After: a one-sentence summary that checks the prediction.

Just for fun

Funny-but-true: when the Globe burned in 1613, a letter written at the time reported that nobody was hurt, except that one man's breeches caught fire. Someone put them out with a bottle of ale.

Hands-on activity

Household text hunt

You need: a notebook and whatever texts you can find at home.

Find five different texts in your home: for example a recipe, an appliance manual, a cereal box, a greeting card with a poem, a news site, a calendar or a novel.
For each, write its family (literary, informational, graphic or mixed) and the purpose someone would have for reading it.
Choose one and read it with a full before, during and after plan. Write one note for each stage.
Make an anticipation guide of three statements for a text you will read next (for example a news article). Mark Agree or Disagree, read, then revisit.

What to look for: purposes that match the text (you scan an appliance manual for one step; you read closely a card's poem if you want to understand it), and notes that clearly come from the right stage.

Your turn

Name the three families of texts and give one example of each.

You need the start time of a hockey game from a long community newsletter. Which reading speed fits, and why?

Give two features that can make a text more complex.

What is an anticipation guide, and at which stage do you first use it?

In the Globe paragraph, how did reading on help with the word galleries?

Write a one-sentence summary of the Globe paragraph.

More practice: warm-up

Is a recipe a literary, informational or graphic text?

What does the annotation symbol ? mean?

Name one strategy you use after reading.

Which reading speed fits a sonnet you must analyse?

In what year was the Globe Theatre built?

More practice: on your own

Why should you name a purpose before you read?

A classmate highlights almost every sentence of an article. What advice would you give, and why?

Explain how the same text can be read for two different purposes. Use a news article as your example.

Write two anticipation-guide statements for a play about a soldier who murders a king to take his throne.

You keep losing track of who is who in a novel with many characters. Suggest a during-reading strategy and explain why it helps.

Challenge

You must compare a poem from the 1600s with one written this century. Design a full before, during and after plan with at least two strategies per stage.

Why might a reader need different strategies for a graphic text (an infographic) than for a poem? Give two specific differences.

A reader says, I just read everything the same way, and I do fine. Evaluate this claim for a Grade 10 Academic student.

Check your understanding

Quiz

Which is a graphic text?

You need one phone number from a long page. You should...

Which strategy is used before reading?

In an annotation code, V marks...

Which feature makes a text more complex?

Why do readers set a purpose?

For parents and teachers

What this lesson teaches: ENG2D Reading and Literature Studies 1.1 (reading a variety of texts from diverse cultures and historical periods, identifying specific purposes) and 1.2 (choosing and using comprehension strategies before, during and after reading).

How to help at home:

Before your teen starts homework reading, ask: "What's your purpose, and how will you read it?"
Model your own reading: say aloud when you skim a flyer or reread a confusing letter from a bank.
Offer sticky notes so library books stay unmarked.

Common difficulties:

One speed for everything. Teens often read a schedule and a poem the same way. Practise switching.
Highlighting everything. Ask them to highlight no more than one sentence per paragraph.
Skipping the after stage. A one-sentence summary takes a minute and shows whether the reading stuck.

Facts used: The Globe Theatre was built in 1599 by Shakespeare's company, the Lord Chamberlain's Men, on the south bank of the Thames; it burned in 1613 when a cannon used during a performance set the thatched roof alight, and was rebuilt in 1614. The modern reconstruction, Shakespeare's Globe, opened in 1997 near the original site. The story of the man whose breeches caught fire comes from a letter of the time by Sir Henry Wotton.